But the fighting was lighter one day after hundreds of residents fled some of the fiercest battles in Mogadishu in 14 years.

The violence stopped in southern Mogadishu after several hours. Sporadic gunfire continued in the north.

Residents of one district in northern Mogadishu took advantage of the limited fighting to leave the capital on foot or in vans, some carrying household items.

Other Mogadishu residents were stranded because they had no money or had to tend to injured family members.

“We have nowhere to go . . . I and my children do not have enough food,” said Medina Hassan, who was tending to her husband at Al Hikma Hospital in a part of southern Mogadishu that was peaceful yesterday.

Hassan said she fled northern Mogadishu, where her husband was injured, to seek shelter with relatives in the southern part of the city.

“Our new place is no more safe,” she said. “Really, I am fed up with the life in this burning city.”

Public Works Minister Osman Hasan Ali Ato – who is also a warlord – and other officials began efforts yesterday to mediate between the warring sides.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi's U.N.-backed government has not been able to assert authority over Somalia, which has been embroiled in clan fighting and without a real government since warlords overthrew longtime dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991.

Islamic fundamentalists reject the government because it is not based on Islam, and they portray themselves as a force capable of bringing order to the country. They accuse the secular alliance of working for the CIA, while the alliance accuses the self-appointed Islamic court leaders of links to al-Qaeda.